There's evidence Tallahassee cops tried to sweep the sexual assault investigation targeting Florida State University QB Jameis Winston under the rug to protect the team and its star player ... and ONLY took aggressive steps after TMZ Sports started asking questions.

Sources in the State Attorney's Office tell us they never even knew about the investigation until Tuesday ... JUST ONE DAY AFTER TMZ Sports began making calls to cops about the alleged assault.

Our sources in the State Attorney's Office say ... it was highly unusual cops wouldn't have filled them in about the case until this week. The sources say cops would have typically notified them when the investigation was completed, and Winston's lawyer reportedly says cops told him it was completed in February.

Now get this ... TMZ Sports started calling police about the case on Monday. We were told someone would get back to us later that day, but there was radio silence for 2 days ... we made repeated calls Tuesday and Wednesday and no one got back to us until late Wednesday afternoon.

Sources in the State Attorney's Office tell us ... the timing -- getting notified about the case months after it supposedly was closed and just a day after TMZ started calling -- is suspicious.

The State Attorney has now re-activated the case and sent it back to cops for further investigation.

And there's a twist -- guess what would happen if Winston was even CHARGED with felony sexual assault -- under FSU's rules ... he would be AUTOMATICALLY BENCHED ... killing the team's national championship hopes and his Heisman Trophy chances.

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ruh roh indeed. That is some old school college police covering for the football team there. Not really going to fly in today's media age... unless it's the Tuscaloosa PD. I still want to know who TMZ's source was.

There's evidence Tallahassee cops tried to sweep the sexual assault investigation targeting Florida State University QB Jameis Winston under the rug to protect the team and its star player ... and ONLY took aggressive steps after TMZ Sports started asking questions.

Sources in the State Attorney's Office tell us they never even knew about the investigation until Tuesday ... JUST ONE DAY AFTER TMZ Sports began making calls to cops about the alleged assault.

Our sources in the State Attorney's Office say ... it was highly unusual cops wouldn't have filled them in about the case until this week. The sources say cops would have typically notified them when the investigation was completed, and Winston's lawyer reportedly says cops told him it was completed in February.

Now get this ... TMZ Sports started calling police about the case on Monday. We were told someone would get back to us later that day, but there was radio silence for 2 days ... we made repeated calls Tuesday and Wednesday and no one got back to us until late Wednesday afternoon.

Sources in the State Attorney's Office tell us ... the timing -- getting notified about the case months after it supposedly was closed and just a day after TMZ started calling -- is suspicious.

The State Attorney has now re-activated the case and sent it back to cops for further investigation.

And there's a twist -- guess what would happen if Winston was even CHARGED with felony sexual assault -- under FSU's rules ... he would be AUTOMATICALLY BENCHED ... killing the team's national championship hopes and his Heisman Trophy chances.

Ruh roh indeed. I also wonder if his lawyer is playing cute. He's stated that Jameis was "never interviewed by police", but I wonder if they submitted a written statement of fact instead. Technically not an interview, and doesn't allow for questioning about the facts and gives the legal team the opportunity to vet the response too.

"The reason college football is college football is because sometimes the 1,000-to-1 longshots suddenly become shortshots.

You folks have it wrong about the REC. Who has the most to gain if FSU gets bumped from the BCS championship game? Now ask yourself who has prior experience of trying to smear a Heisman candidate.

Lookway way up north for your culprit.

+1

The same exact piece of ish that leaked all of the Cam/Cecil Newton crap years ago. He urged his old assistant (Mullen) to drag that crap up about Newton.

The same scumbag that leaked clasified info about Cam's academic standing while at FLA (that was info that only a FLA employee would have been privy to.)

The same exact donkey dung that left FLA for health reasons only to jet right back into coaching once the big time job at OSU became available.

This crap has Urban Meyer written all over it - I wouldn't put it past him to try to derail FSU's shots while his team benefits.

Those are good points, but wouldn't it benefit Bama to play Ohio State, which hasn't exactly had a tough schedule this year, than Florida State, who handily beat 2 top-10 teams (Clemson and Miami) and are also undefeated. And, don't forget the fact that Jimbo has coached under Saban and probably knows Saban's means and methods and can coach his team what to expect from Saban.

Sure Randy - conspiracies have all sorts of angles with which to view a subject.

I haven't exactly seen UAT or Saban back down from a challenge in the last few years - they don't come across as a program that would choose the easy route any more than Urban Meyer would try to replicate and create some drama about a player or program that is currently blocking his sights to the big game. I suppose anything is possible though.

Let's fact it, Urban was in desperation mode back in '10 and he stooped so low as to throw trash out about one of his former players that was in Heisman contention and was leading his team to an undefeated season & eventual BCSNC. Urban had the monkey on his back at that time and ended up throwing in the towel and walking out due to "health issues." Urban is about a scummy has they come, IMO.

The only thing I could say is that maybe Bama does things for it's own purpose. After all, they found out about Ha Ha's little financial benefit from the S&C assistant coach this past summer, but waited until about a month ago to make it public so they could suspend him for a couple of pansy games and have him ready for LSU. The NCAA thought Bama took the bull by the balls in handling this situation. No doubt Meyer is a piece of work (for lack of wanting to write another 4-letter word) and he could very well be behind this mess.

If the cops did cover this up, I have to wonder why. After all, Winston, while being a highly-rated QB prospect and signee for FSU, hadn't played a down of football for FSU. How did they know he would be the Heisman front-runner that he is now at that time? How many 4 and 5 star recruits at all schools over the years didn't pan out as expected. Anybody remember Billy Ray? How about "Lectron" Williams?

Is it true that his girlfriend arrived in Tallahassee on the 7th after the alledged incident?
How could the victim's description say the perpetrator was between 5'11" and 6'1"? JW is near 6'5". That is a big difference. There aren't that many 6'5" people walking around so the height alone should make him stand out and she should recognize that.
Was it a setup from the beginning?

Ruh roh indeed. I also wonder if his lawyer is playing cute. He's stated that Jameis was "never interviewed by police", but I wonder if they submitted a written statement of fact instead. Technically not an interview, and doesn't allow for questioning about the facts and gives the legal team the opportunity to vet the response too.

Why would his lawyer play "cute?" Saying JW was never interviewed would only make the PD look bad and that is not the smart thing to do in my opinion.

The more I think about this the more this may really blow up in FSU's face. As far as college scandals buying a player is minor compared to covering up sexual assault.

Ruh roh indeed. I also wonder if his lawyer is playing cute. He's stated that Jameis was "never interviewed by police", but I wonder if they submitted a written statement of fact instead. Technically not an interview, and doesn't allow for questioning about the facts and gives the legal team the opportunity to vet the response too.

Why would his lawyer play "cute?" Saying JW was never interviewed would only make the PD look bad and that is not the smart thing to do in my opinion.

The more I think about this the more this may really blow up in FSU's face. As far as college scandals buying a player is minor compared to covering up sexual assault.

Just ask Penn State and their police department about coverups......

FSU may not be involved, but something is not right over at the Tallahassee police department.

So an OSU, UF, Miami, or UAT fan at the police department could have tipped off TMZ? Or it could be just as simple as an honest policeman not being happy with the special treatment a star FSU player was getting.

If this happen in Dec of 2012, Winston was still a freshman at the end of his redshirt season. They knew he had potential, but he was not a star player at the time.